SHURALE

SHURALE is a demon in Bashkir mythology. It appears in bylichkas. It looks like a human-like creature with horns and long fingers with sharp (copper) nails or as a woman with ginger hair, hanging breasts and backward feet, or sometimes as a log or tree. It lives in forests, mountains, on the riverbanks. S. often cries and teases people; leads them astray to the thick forest where it tickles them to death; kidnaps babies left in the forest without notice. It likes to ride horses that are on the pasture. People smear the back on a horse with resin to catch S. It is scared of water, that it why people can escape from it by crossing a river; it is possible to destroy it by ripping out its heart or lungs through the hole under its armpit or by pinching its fingers. It hunts and has family; its wives and daughters are very beautiful. Sometimes a person marries S. and their clan divides (the legend “Shurale’s descendants”). Albasty, bisura, pyariy, yarymtyk have features similar to S. The character is common for mythology of many peoples.

Z.G. Aminev